Asa Zoo: Creatures great and small in the hills of Hiroshima

GetHiroshima was recently invited to take a tour behind the scenes, with the hope that we would share its activities and mission with our readers. Intrigued, we accepted the invitation, hoping to gain some insight into how the zoo views its role today in a world that has changed much since it first opened.

Located in the hills north of central Hiroshima, Asa Zoo opened in 1971. The city-administrated zoo has welcomed generations of visitors over its just over 50-year history. You will be hard-pressed to find anyone who grew up in Hiroshima who didn’t visit the Asa Zoo at least once during childhood. While attitudes towards zoos have significantly changed over the past half-century, it is still a popular destination for school trips and family days out.

130 species from near and far

Asa Zoo is home to around 130 species, including perennial favorites such as two species of African elephants, black rhinos, big cats, giraffes, and the baboons that live on the artificial “Baboon Mountain.” Red pandas (lesser pandas), Humbolt penguins, otters, and guinea pigs in (Pichiku Park) the children’s zoo, score highly for cuteness.

Visitors from overseas may be interested in common but rarely seen endemic Japanese animals, such as the real-life tanuki raccoon dogs that many have seen depicted dressed in straw hats and clutching bottles of sake in front of shops and restaurants.

Somewhat unique to Asa Zoo is the Japanese Giant Salamander, one of the world’s largest species, found in the clear waters of local rivers in the north of Hiroshima Prefecture. Just how large they can grow can be seen in the zoo’s museum space, where a 1.5m long specimen called Mu-chan has been preserved for display.

The zoo’s Asiatic black bears are also local, evidenced by the fact that, on our visit, part of the zoo was closed to the public due to a wild bear strolling around at night being caught on CCTV.

From slightly further afield are the zoo’s Kamoshika, Japanese serows, which have always struck me as a beast that has stepped out of Narnia.

Conservation and research activities

Asa Zoo has been engaged in conservation efforts since its founding. One of the zoo’s original residents, Hana, a black rhino, produced ten calves (a Japanese record). Eight of these were transferred to other zoos in Japan and abroad. Although Hana passed away in 2018, her great-great-grandchildren continue to play a part in preserving the black rhino species in captivity.

Asa Zoo received the Koga Award, the highest honor given to zoos and aquariums in Japan, for its rhino breeding program. It has since received the prestigious award on multiple occasions for its work breeding for Cape hyrax (a small African mammal with a permanent smile on its face), over 100 zebras, and giant salamanders.

The big news is that, in a Japan-first, May-chan, an African forest elephant considered critically endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, is pregnant!

May’s keeper, Ryota Kurihara, told us that a male named, who was brought in from Akiyoshidai Safari Park in neighboring Yamaguchi Prefecture, mated successfully after some coaxing. Some of their “courting” is documented here [ja], along with updates on May’s pregnancy—happy events like this help to raise a zoo’s profile and boost visitors.

Despite the considerable PR opportunity, the media is restricting access to the zoo to ensure that May is disturbed as little as possible during her pregnancy.

Kurihara was excited and moved by the happy event in equal parts. “It’s not unusual for a keeper to go through their whole career without an opportunity to experience something like this. I feel truly blessed.

I ask Kurihara about the confined living area the elephants live in. He doesn’t dodge my question and indicates with sadness that some of the movements made by the larger African savannah elephant in the enclosure beside May’s indicate boredom. He tells us that they try to switch up the animal’s routines and introduce methods more closely replicating feeding in the wild, but they can only go so far.

A duty of care

Confined living spaces are one of the main reservations many have about zoos. On my visits to Asa Zoo, I must confess that I always feel uncomfortable looking at the areas where big cats are kept. That said, spending time with keepers like Kurihara, I am struck by the genuine attachment to and feeling of responsibility for the animals they look after.

Moving from the zoo’s largest residents to some of its smallest, Mizuki Kittaka greets us with a smile. Kittaka is assigned to the guinea pigs and rabbits in the zoo’s popular Pichiku Park petting area.

We arrive in the middle of the daily guinea pig petting time. Parents line up with their little kids, getting ready to meet their new little friends. Kittaka and her assistant explain how to handle the guinea pigs carefully to eliminate as much stress from the experience as possible. The children are clearly delighted, and the guinea pigs seem pretty content too.

Kittaka explains that they limit the number of children and rotate the animals to avoid overstressing them. They know all these little critters intimately and match the animals’ temperament with the children they pass them on to.

She feels that children have much to gain from this kind of interaction with animals. For this reason, the zoo stopped including rabbits in the petting experience to encourage the children to focus on the precious time with their guinea pig, undistracted by the promise of petting another animal.

Behind the scenes, Kittaka has also worked on increasing the living space available to the guinea pigs and attempting to make it as close to their natural habitat as possible. She monitors the guinea pigs closely, especially after they have been involved in the petting experience, looking out for signs of stress, such as loss of appetite.

She admits they still have some way to go, showing us some of the older guinea pigs that have been retired from the petting experience. It is, however, heartwarming to see the level of concern and dedication to the welfare of such small creatures.

Research and conservation

As a municipal facility, we asked about the route to becoming a zoo keeper in Japan and where most of the staff comes from. Fumiya Sakamoto tells us that the staff at Asa Zoo come from various fields. Many have graduated from agricultural universities or have an academic research background. Staff are encouraged to perform research and publish scholarly papers based on their findings.

Asa Zoo’s most significant contribution to academic research is perhaps its work on the Japanese Giant Salamander, known in Japanese as the notoriously difficult-to-pronounce Ōsanshōuo. One of the world’s largest amphibians, it is designated a vulnerable species.

The world’s first successful breeding of a wild-born specimen in captivity was achieved at Asa Zoo in 1979, and a dedicated Giant Salamander Conservation and Breeding Facility was opened in 1997. Konami Shimizu: kindly showed us around the facility outside the zoo grounds.

A series of tanks of differing shapes connected by pipes in various configurations have been set up to encourage the breeding of captive giant salamanders. We were introduced to Igaguri, one of the facility’s most productive females. Igaguri was born in the facility in 1980. Since first laying eggs at the age of 17, she has spawned 15 times, breaking the world record for the oldest individual (of known age) to spawn.

Moving from tank to tank, we can see how these fascinating creatures develop from tiny babies to mottled brown specimens that can grow up to about 1.5 meters in length and weigh up to 25kg. Amazingly, despite their size, their sedentary lifestyle means they require only the calories from a single small fish about once a week.

Asa Zoo occasionally opens up the breeding facility to members of the public, but several specimens reside in a tank in the zoo’s Reptile House. They can be tricky to spot, but definitely take a look when you visit.

Kengaku sankai setsu: One life, three visits

Fumiya Sakamoto tells us that it is often said that “people go to the zoo three times in their lifetime. The first time as a child, the second time as a parent, and the third time as a grandparent.”

It’s a pattern that surely firmly embeds the experience in the part of the brain that handles memorable experiences that invoke a strong sense of nostalgia. Still, it is a challenging market in an era of declining birthrates. Further, while the kids that we walk by are clearly excited to see the animals on display, there is no doubt that there are way more entertainment options that compete for their attention and affection than even back in the days when their young parents first visited.

Then there is climate change. Extreme temperatures during recent summers have hit visitor numbers hard. Asa Zoo introduced after-dark summer “Night Safari” openings in 2003. These opportunities to enjoy cooler temperatures at the hilltop zoo, with the bonus of viewing more active animals at night, proved a popular date activity, perhaps bumping the number of lifetime visits to four.

Financial challenges and community support

Part of Asa Zoo’s outreach is to international residents and visitors from overseas. Many of the animal enclosures have cute hand-illustrated manga-style signs created by zoo staff, which explain interesting facts about the animals in Japanese and English.

The affection many in Hiroshima and beyond have for Asa Zoo can be seen in the response to a recent crowdfunding campaign to raise money to support forest elephant May during her pregnancy and her newborn baby.

The campaign, which raised over 30 million yen to fund hormone testing equipment to help detect birth signs in advance, a camera to allow remote observation, and buying elephant milk, far exceeded their initial goal of 9 million yen.

There is much uncertainty around the birth, especially as it is May’s first birth, and she is not surrounded by animals that have experienced raising young. In addition to 300kg of feed before the birth, the zoo is prepared to provide up to 1.5 tons of powdered milk in the first two years of the baby elephant’s life. In the happy event that May takes well to motherhood, and the additional milk is not required, any excess money will be used to improve the living conditions of the elephants and other animals in other ways.

As a city-run facility, budget constraints are always challenging– hence the importance of crowd funding campaigns like the one mentioned above. The zoo, however, is in the midst of a 30-year 9 billion yen redevelopment process that aims to improve the animals’ living environment. With an eye on the ageing population, it also aims to make it easier for visitors to get from exhibit to exhibit in the expansive park. Sakamoto mentions that adjustments are constantly being made to accommodate new research findings over an extended period, but plans include a new facility devoted to Japanese Giant Salamanders and a new Reptile House.

Our visit to Asa Zoo was enlightening. Meeting some of the people who care for the animals was inspiring. Though reservations about the place of zoos in the 21st century remain, it was reassuring to feel how dedicated they are to these incredible specimens, both large and small.

Asa Zoo

Opening hours: 09:00-16:30 (extended opening during summer Night Safari)
Closed: Thursdays and December 29-January 1
Tel: 082-838-1111
URL: http://www.asazoo.jp/